Vedas and ancient Egypt

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Vedas and ancient Egypt                                     Through the Vedas we

can reclaim the spiritual heritage of                  the entire ancient world

that can help take us beyond the                  current materialistic culture

and the many problems it                  continues to bring us.            

                        THE VEDAS represent a monumental spiritual literature,

by far thelargest, that remains from the ancient world. We could therefore

callthe Vedas, `the pyramids of the ancient mind.' The Vedas are theoldest

record of the great dharmic             traditions of theEast, with not only

the Hindu but also Buddhist,             Jain,Sikh and Zoroastrian traditions

part of the same greater            stream of spiritual striving. Apart from

the biblical tradition,            this dharmic or Indic tradition is one of

the two dominantstreams             of world spirituality that has endured

throughoutthe centuries and             remains vital to the present day, asthe

global popularity of Yoga,             Vedanta and Buddhismclearly

reveals.             If we look at the Vedic tradition, we see that

it             wasbased upon an ancient priestly order that was extensive

and            sophisticated, comparable to the priestly orders of ancient

Egyptor             Babylonia. This priestly order was concerned notmerely with

rituals             but also with spirituality, yoga,philosophy, medicine,

astronomy             and architecture thatform the basis of the various

Upavedas and             Vedangas.            This spiritual culture of ancient

India can easily             becompared with that of ancient Egypt, which was

similarly guided            by extensive priestly orders, their sophisticated

rituals andan             emphasis of mysticism and magic. As ancient Egypt

wasarguably the             spiritual centre of the West in the ancientworld,

so India can be             said to be the spiritual centre ofthe ancient

East.             The             Greek bias                         One of the

main mistakes that western scholars have             madeis to approach Vedic

civilisation using ancient Greece as their            starting off point. They

look at the Vedas like the works ofHomer,             reflecting traditions

like the Greeks who onlycame on the scene             during the late ancient

period (after1500 BCE). They view the Vedic             people like the

ancientGreeks as mainly a warrior people, on the             move, as partof

various proposed Aryan invasions/migrations of the            time. They place

Vedic culture in the mould of the type of primitive            tribal

Indo-European culture much like what they proposewas at the             root of

Greek civilisation. The Western dateof 1500 BCE for the             Vedas was

made to parallel their 1500BCE date for the early Greeks             (though

biblicalconstraints also entered into the picture).             However, Homer

and the oldest Greek literature of             theIliad and the Odyssey at best

resemble Hindu epics like the            Mahabharata that came at the end of the

Vedic period (but without            the same depth of Vedantic thought or a

dominant gurufigure like             Krishna). The Homeric model was of a

lessspiritual and more recent             culture to which thematerialistic

western civilisation could             comfortablytrace itself. It did not

reflect a mystic, rishi or yogi            culture like that of the Vedas or

that of ancient Egypt.             Along with this mistake, western scholars

have             tried touse language as the determinative factor for

judging            ancient cultures #8212; as if groups that spoke languages

belongingto             the same language family must possess a similar

orcontemporaneous             culture as well. However, we should notethat

language families have             persisted through varioushistorical ages and

different types of             cultures. Forexample, we cannot make medieval

Russian and ancient            Persian contemporaneous or similar in

civilisation because of some            linguistic affinities. On the other

hand, cultures of thesame time             period have similar civilisations in

spite oflanguage differences.             The ancient Romans, for example,had

much in common culturally with             the Carthaginians whohad a similar

life-style and lived in the same             part ofthe world, in spite of

speaking languages that did not            belong to the same

family.             Therefore, we must look at the Vedas according

to             thecultural affinities of ancient civilisations, not

merely            according to linguistic affinities. As a type of

spiritual/priestly            culture, Vedic civilisation resembles more that

of earlierEgypt or             Babylonia than that of Greece.             The

Greeks, though speaking a language with             affinitieswith Vedic

Sanskrit, represented a later ancient culture            already moving away

from the spiritual and hieratic civilisations of            the early ancient

world.             A  reevaluation                         Western scholars

invented the term `henotheism' to describe how anyone of the many Vedic Gods

could represent all the Gods (a situationthat prevails among the Puranic Gods

as well). We should note thatthey used the same term for the ancient Egyptian

religion which had asimilar view of multiplicity in unity among its many Gods.

The Vedicand Egyptian Sun Gods follow the same model of henotheism, being

boththe One God in essence and many different Gods in function.            Many

symbols are common to ancient Egypt and India            including the worship

of the Sun and Sun kings, the sacred bull, the            hawk or falcon, and

the seeking of immortality as the maingoal of             life. Indeed the

Vedic ritual of the Yajur Vedareflects a similar             spirit to the

Egyptian Book of theDead. Like the Vedic, the             Egyptians not only

had a loveof magic and the occult, but with             their symbols like

thecobra at the crown of the head, suggest a             knowledge ofYoga as

well. Yet such connections have been ignored            because they are

cultural rather than linguistic in basis.            Egyptian culture endured

from before 3000 BCE down             to theearly Christian era. Isis and

Osiris were worshipped in Rome            as well as in the Old Kingdom of

Egypt. Similarly, Vedic deities            need not be limited to the later

eras in which they arestill             mentioned. Their worship could easily

extend backto the 3000 BCE             date that we commonly find in

Puranictexts as marking the beginning             of the Kali Yuga.           

The archaeological record of India is of a             monumentalcivilisation

that persisted from 3000 BCE, if not            earlier, not only into the late

ancient era, like Egypt, but with a            modified continuity up to the

present day. In India todaywe find             the same types of rituals and

temple worshipstill being practised             as once occurred in ancient

Egyptand Babylonia. That this type of             spiritual ancientcivilisation

has survived only in India suggests             how deepseated and original it

must have been in the country.             While ancient India did not leave

monuments like             thepyramids of Egypt, it did leave extensive urban

remains and its            great Vedic literature, its pyramids of the mind.

Connectingthe             monumental spiritual literature of the Vedas, notonly

with the             great urban civilisation of ancient India,but with a

similar             spiritual civilisational model asancient Egypt, will

provide us             with a better approach tothe Vedas that can help unravel

their             spiritual secrets.Through the Vedas we can reclaim the

spiritual             heritageof the entire ancient world that can help take us

beyond            the current materialistic culture and the many problems it

continues            to bring us.                         DAVID

FRAWLEY                                     ______

[Guest guest]

vediculture, "M.P.Bhattathiry" <mpmahesh@a...>

wrote:

 

> If we look at the Vedic tradition, we see that it

was based upon an ancient priestly order that was extensive and

sophisticated, comparable to the priestly orders of ancient Egypt

or Babylonia. This priestly order was concerned not merely with

rituals but also with spirituality, yoga, philosophy, medicine,

astronomy and architecture that form the basis of the various

Upavedas and Vedangas.>

For an imaginative account of the relations between the ancient

Vedic and Egyptian civlization, see Bhagwan Gidwani's monumental (900

pages) novel detailing Aryan movement out of India to other parts of

the world and their eventual return to India in "Return of the

Aryans" (New Delhi: Penguin India 1994). See particularly

chapters "Kings of Egypt and the Language of the Gods" and "Egypt and

the Kingdom of Ajitab."

 

S.Tilak